title: Mismatch negativity to the patient's own name in chronic disorders of consciousness.
abstract: Previous studies implicated potential value of mismatch negativity (MMN) in predicting recovery of consciousness in patients with disorders of consciousness (DOC). We have adopted a novel MMN evoked by subject's own name (SON), a self-referential stimulus thought to be powerful in evoking residual brain activity, and examined the correlation between the MMN and recovery of consciousness in patients with chronic (>1 month) DOC. Twelve patients and 12 age-matched healthy controls were investigated. The patients were diagnosed as coma (n=4), vegetative state (VS, n=6), and minimally conscious state (MCS, n=2), mainly based on the JFK Coma Recovery Scale-Revised. The SON-evoked MMN (SON-MMN) was present in seven patients. Critically, the presence of SON-MMN was significantly correlated with recovery of consciousness. While four of the five patients (three VS and two coma) showing SON-MMN changed to MCS 3 months later, the rest of the patients (three VS and two coma) without SON-MMN failed to show any clinical improvement. Our study thus illustrates that the subject's own name is effective in evoking MMN in patients with DOC, and that SON-MMN has potential prognostic values in predicting recovery of consciousness.
authors.affiliation: Laboratory for Higher Brain Functions, Institute of Psychology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, 4A Datun Road, Chaoyang District, Beijing 100101, China.
authors.forename: Pengmin
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Qin
authors.forename: Haibo
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Di
authors.forename: Xiaodan
authors.initials: X
authors.lastname: Yan
authors.forename: Senming
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Yu
authors.forename: Dan
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Yu
authors.forename: Steven
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Laureys
authors.forename: Xuchu
authors.initials: X
authors.lastname: Weng
mesh_terms: D000161:Acoustic Stimulation / Q000379:methods; D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D001307:Auditory Perception; D016022:Case-Control Studies; D002908:Chronic Disease; D003244:Consciousness Disorders / Q000503:physiopathology*; D003265:Contingent Negative Variation / Q000502:physiology*; D004569:Electroencephalography; D005072:Evoked Potentials, Auditory / Q000502:physiology*; D005260:Female; D005500:Follow-Up Studies; D015600:Glasgow Coma Scale; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D009275:Names